Kari Porter

Kari probably has more auction management experience than anybody at Handbid, having managed her first auction for her son’s preschool in 2004. Back then, there were paper bid sheets, and “card on file” meant a carbon of your credit card stored in a manilla folder — yikes! When the Porters got started with their own fundraisers in 2005, Kari knew just what to do! Prior to being a full time mom, Kari was a software developer working for enterprises like American Management Systems and Sybase. After their daughter was born with Prader-Willi syndrome in 2002, Kari shifted gears to focusing on the house and kids. But that did not stop Jeff and Kari from starting up a charity in 2004 and running auction events. After helping start Handbid in 2011, Kari became “full time” in 2015. Leveraging her computer science background, Kari quickly helped complete and launch a new version of the platform. She also focused on automating most of the company’s operations, allowing it to remain lean and mean. Today, the team still refers to Kari as the “wizard behind the curtain.”